---
title: Smilodon could open its jaws about 120 degrees, much wider than a li… — Ice Age: real sabre-tooths, ground sloths, glypt… · tree and pragmatics
description: Smilodon could open its jaws about 120 degrees, much wider than a lion, so the long fangs did not get in the way of biting, and its bite was weaker than a lion's because the long fangs could snap on bone. Who acts: Smilodon, long fangs, bite, kind. A sentence of the lesson «Ice Age: real sabre-tooth
---

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# Ice Age: real sabre-tooths, ground sloths, glyptodonts and dodos, sentence 5

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Smilodon could open its jaws about 120 degrees, much wider than a lion, so the long fangs did not get in the way of biting, and its bite was weaker than a lion's because the long fangs could snap on bone.

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**Who acts:** Smilodon, long fangs, bite, kind · **What happens:** open, not get, be, snap, bite · **To what, where:** jaws, way, bone

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This is a sentence of the lesson «Ice Age: real sabre-tooths, ground sloths, glyptodonts and dodos» of the biology course of Mova's primary school. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Smilodon, long fangs, bite, kind), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = school:biology:131-ice-age-sabre-tooths-ground-sloths-and-scrat.lesson:5
# text = Smilodon could open its jaws about 120 degrees, much wider than a lion, so the long fangs did not get in the way of biting, and its bite was weaker than a lion's because the long fangs could snap on bone.
# source = school lesson (ours)
# course = biology
# lesson = 131-ice-age-sabre-tooths-ground-sloths-and-scrat.lesson
# annotation = Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R5-strong ×1, R7-rel-agree ×1
1	Smilodon	Smilodon	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	3	nsubj	_	_
2	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
3	open	open	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
4	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	5	nmod:poss	_	_
5	jaws	jaw	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	obj	_	_
6	about	about	ADV	RB	_	7	advmod	_	Agree=R5-strong|Haiku=8:case|HaikuPos=ADP:IN:_
7	120	120	NUM	CD	NumForm=Digit|NumType=Card	8	nummod	_	_
8	degrees	degree	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	obl	_	_
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
10	much	much	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
11	wider	wide	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	3	parataxis	_	_
12	than	than	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
13	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	lion	lion	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	_
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
16	so	so	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
18	long	long	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	fangs	fang	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	22	nsubj	_	_
20	did	do	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	22	aux	_	_
21	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	22	advmod	_	_
22	get	get	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	parataxis	_	Agree=R7-rel-agree|Haiku=3:conj
23	in	in	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
24	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	way	way	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obl	_	_
26	of	of	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
27	biting	biting	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	nmod	_	_
28	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	33	punct	_	_
29	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	33	cc	_	_
30	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	31	nmod:poss	_	_
31	bite	bite	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	33	nsubj	_	_
32	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	33	cop	_	_
33	weaker	weak	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	22	conj	_	_
34	than	than	ADP	IN	_	36	case	_	_
35	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	36	det	_	_
36	lion	lion	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	33	obl	_	_
37	's	's	PART	POS	_	36	case	_	_
38	because	because	SCONJ	IN	_	43	mark	_	_
39	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	41	det	_	_
40	long	long	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	41	amod	_	_
41	fangs	fang	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	43	nsubj	_	_
42	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	43	aux	_	_
43	snap	snap	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	33	advcl	_	_
44	on	on	ADP	IN	_	45	case	_	_
45	bone	bone	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	43	obl	_	_
46	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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- form: statement
- act: assert
- voice: narrator
- polarity: none
- teacher: kept the draft

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **open** | could | Smilodon | kind's jaws |  |  |  | 120 degrees *obl* | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location jaw=Theme |
| 2 | **not** **get** | past · do-support | the long fangs |  |  | the way of biting |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Experiencer |
| 3 | **is** | past | kind's bite |  |  |  |  | than a lion; weak *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **snap** | could | the long fangs |  |  | bone |  |  | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme on bone=Location |
| 5 | **bite** |  | kind |  |  |  |  |  | nom bite «state transitive»: poss=agent |

<!-- .note -->
One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

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**Licence: [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/)**, as the whole of Mova corpus 0.4, of which this treebank (the agreed school, `mova-school-agreed-en.conllu`) is part. The lessons were written for Mova's primary school. Sentence `school:biology:131-ice-age-sabre-tooths-ground-sloths-and-scrat.lesson:5`.

**The tree:** Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R5-strong ×1, R7-rel-agree ×1. **The frames** are read from the tree by Mova's frames reader (`prag`) when this page is built, the lesson read in order, so a pronoun may be resolved from an earlier sentence.

See the [release 0.4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/releases/0.4/).

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